The Cycle of Loving
by dreamtaller
Summary: It's unsteady. It stumbles. It grows. Suffused in Konoha's sunlight, their love begins.  Leegaa/ Gaalee. M rating.
1. Chapter 1: The Unbeginning

Pairings: Rock Lee x Gaara (Leegaa, Gaalee both)

Rating: Definitely M

Setting: Konoha

Characters: Strong focus on Lee/Gaara. Other appearances= Kiba, Hinata, Sasuke, Ino. Characters referred to= Naruto, Sakura, Temari, Kankuro.

Note: I do not own any of these characters.

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It Grew

Slowly and unsteadily, as the leaves change colour, a bond materializes.

How had it begun? That was the question that hung over them all through their sunny sojourns during months of peace and fighting. It was a pleasant question, something that came to mind in languid afternoons, when one head lay sleepily on a gentle shoulder and the red hair mingled with the black. It was simple and clean. It was miraculous. It was the result of Gaara's exile.

Gaara had been living in Konoha for the past some months. The reason was not pleasant. He had been overthrown as kazekage when sentiments towards Konoha had embittered in Suna. It was a quick decision in the confusion of battle. When he had returned, another man presided, backed by Suna's people. A quick little change of hands. A robbery. "There is nothing left for me here." he had informed his siblings when he left. Eventually, they followed after him. He knew they would.

Both their villages were recovering from the ashes of an earth-shaking war. As Konoha built itself anew, he was part of its rebirth. Reborn as a citizen of Konoha. He longed for the days he would walk back into the desert sands, but understood his future was hidden. Hope, though. He had that beautiful gift now. Someday he would go back. In the meantime, he worked alongside the shuffled-up shinobi teams. More and more often, the person he paired up with was someone from his darkest past… Rock Lee. But the past was behind them. It had been behind them the moment they parted from that glade in the grass where a sad bone statue grew. The future, though. He had been blind to the future. The beautiful future.

"What are you thinking about?" asked a familiar voice. Slightly formal, yet a little too loud.

"Things that don't matter." Gaara replied without looking around.

Instead of replying to Gaara's vague answers, Lee invariably gave a good-natured smile. He wasn't much when it came to intellectual conversation.

After a silent little pause, Gaara looked at him. He couldn't resist. His eyes took in the sight of Lee's puzzled face framed by his sleek black hair. His skin was slightly jagged with rough patches and slight scars, but they added to the strange beauty this ugly man had. He was wearing his usual black spandex under his usual ninja vest. With satisfaction, Gaara noted that Lee was a little uncomfortable under his unblinking gaze.

But Lee swallowed that with another cheerful smile and sat beside Gaara, who felt himself grow slightly hotter, and reacted by acting distinctly colder.

"Why are you here?" he asked, his voice a level monotone.

"I'm free for the afternoon." Lee said pleasantly. "I wanted to see you."

Gaara was fighting back the beginning of a smile that nobody would be able to detect. But he said nothing.

"Gaara?" Lee was asking, hesitance colouring his voice. "Why are you always so silent?"

"The same reason you are so loud."

"Oh." Lee mumbled. Then he asked "Why are you so nervous then?"

Gaara looked up quickly, at Lee, then away. "I'm not nervous." he said.

"You are." Lee responded patiently. "Around me, at least."

Gaara got up and left, but his spirit felt curiously light and free.

Lee watched after him as he walked away, sighing impatiently to himself. Gaara's behavior was odd to read, but he could at least understand that his true emotions were never on the surface. He smiled ruefully, acknowledging all the optimism he had for what Gaara really felt. He stretched himself a bit and leaned against the tree. The afternoon wind in the leaves lulled him softly to sleep. He liked the sound of leaves. Simple little pleasures made life all the more worth living. Footsteps made him wake up again- a pretty girl passed by. He watched her shyly through a space between his eyelashes, hoping she wouldn't notice. But she did notice and winked at him, making him flinch and turn his red face away. He was nothing at this.

xxXxx


	2. Chapter 2 Dawn and Twilight

Pairings: Rock Lee x Gaara

Rating: Definitely M

Setting: Konoha

Characters: Strong focus on Lee/Gaara. Other appearances= Kiba, Hinata, Sasuke, Ino. Characters referred to= Naruto, Sakura, Temari, Kankuro.

Note: I do not own any of these characters.

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A few days later, Gaara was strapping his gourd across his chest. There was a mission to be finished. Naruto sure yanked their chains around, he thought amusedly to himself. He was meant to meet Lee at the gates, but found himself treading the path to his small house and rapping at its door. He was early. It was just after dawn. He heard Lee stagger to the door in sleep-heavy steps and fiddle with the bolt.

A shaft of light penetrated the semi-darkness and silhouetted Lee. Gaara felt a small pang of some sort to see Lee in this tousle-haired, pajama-clad form. He had no shirt on. Gaara's eyes felt strained from the effort of not stealing a quick glance.

"Are you crazy?" Lee was shouting, while Gaara wasn't listening. Making the effort to move without contact, he slid past Lee and sat on his brown couch. "We were due to start in three more hours!" Lee was raging.

"I wanted to see you." Gaara smirked.

Lee flushed in angry recognition.

"Put a shirt on." Gaara said.

"Why? Does it bother you?" Lee grumbled.

"It might." allowed Gaara.

"So subtle." muttered Lee.

"So slow." rejoined Gaara.

For a moment, they both looked at each other across the room. Their eyes held each other steadily. Then Gaara dropped his eyes to gaze steadily at Lee's bare brown muscles. Lee let him, looking very irritated. After a minute or two, he headed for one of the inner rooms and emerged with a shirt on.

"You make no sense, you know that?" Lee informed him, looking straight into his eyes. Gaara nodded seriously at him, and said, "Yes.".

Maybe in that moment of honesty, everything could have been bared between them, but these things were slow and painful, built on foundations of firm friendship and watered with impossible dreams. Going too fast would rob its soul. So they both had a silent breakfast and left for the mission, side-by-side.

xXXxx

"NO!"

But the warning wasn't needed of course. Sand armour.

The kidnappers had turned out to be of the inhuman variety. And Lee and Gaara had failed. They had been unable to save the girl. She had cried and shrieked "SAVE ME!" and held out small, sinless hands right before the poison passed through the needles stuck to her neck. Lee had instantly descended on the killer with a mad rage to break his skull, but Gaara had closed his eyes in pain and stood motionless as more needles cut the air and flew towards him.

"NO!" Lee had screamed, but the sand armour caught them in its grip.

The kidnappers took advantage of Lee's distraction and landed some solid blows on his body. His mouth gushed blood a second before he turned over and broke one of their necks with the leg strapped with weights. Gaara, afraid of the steady stream of blood from Lee's mouth, quickly ended the other man's life. He walked across the floor strewn with blood and bodies, so familiar, and bent over Lee, gently and tenderly. He took his face in his hands. Lee assured him softly that he was fine, mouth slightly slurred from the blood.

They buried the poisoned body and they journeyed back slowly, hearts heavy. Gaara supported Lee, after doing the best he could with the bandages.

"Hospital for me…" Lee had tried laughing.

"Shut up." Gaara told him, stony because he was worried.

"I love… being with you." Lee had panted, smiling slightly.

"Shut up." Gaara had said, a note of finality in his voice.

xxXXxx


	3. Chapter 3: Choosing You

Pairings: Rock Lee x Gaara

Rating: Definitely M

Setting: Konoha

Characters: Strong focus on Lee/Gaara. Other appearances= Kiba, Hinata, Sasuke, Ino. Characters referred to= Naruto, Sakura, Temari, Kankuro.

Note: I do not own any of these characters.

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Maybe that was the incident that did it. Lee spent a week at the hospital, severly distressed at his failure. The girls' parents were hysterical, and had defamed him far and wide as an inept ninja. Lee took it all in his stride, but the guilt ate him up slowly at night. Gaara knew it. So after the second day, he visited Lee at night the remainder of the week.

"How could I have let that happen?" Lee would say, struggling to keep his voice from breaking.

"I let it happen as much as you did." Gaara would tell him.

"Why wasn't I faster?" Lee would lament.

"We didn't expect them to do that." Gaara would say reasonably. "We expected them to wait for ransom and to pity the girl's live. We depended on their having human instincts."

The same thing happened the fourth night. On the fifth, when Lee began his guilty babbling, Gaara had felt a mad and sudden bravery- perhaps because of Lee's face looking so helplessly up at him for consolation. So he had leaned forward in the moonlight, and placed his lips firmly on Lee's. In that touch sudden truth and love pulsed through them both like a current, and something inside them finally connected. One last piece in its place. The foundation was built. The door was open. All the time they spent together, all the things they did, merged into one.

And so Lee lifted an arm and pulled Gaara up over himself so that the kiss was easier. Their bodies felt hot that night. Gaara was even bold enough to slide a hand underneath Lee's shirt to caress his chest, but there they stopped, because then Lee had made a sudden movement that seemed almost like he was shrinking away. Gaara had looked questioningly into Lee's eyes. But this time Lee's eyes were closed to the other. It was disconcerting to look at each other like strangers when one lay beneath the other and one sat upon him, faces so intimately close. Gaara had decided it would be best to leave.

The rest of the week went on as if a new universe had not been born and nothing had happened at all. Lee was discharged, he went home. They didn't see each other for another week. Gaara felt Lee was avoiding him, and he could not figure out why.

"I wonder what he's thinking now." Gaara found himself wondering. "What I did may have been a foolish step. But the step was in the correct general direction."

He made his way to the same tree he usually sat under in the afternoons. He was hoping Lee would show up. Half an hour passed and the sun warmed him thoroughly, but Lee did not come. Slowly, Gaara grew bored and irritable. He stood up to leave, when suddenly, a movement caught his eye.

Long blonde hair. A woman.

It wasn't Lee, so Gaara shrugged and stepped away, but something stopped him. He stole another glance at her.

She was truly a divine beauty. Her hair was a long golden ponytail, and her eyes were the most dazzling of blues he had ever seen. As she walked, his attention strayed to her body- deliciously bare at the mid-riff. Heavy round breasts sealed in a tight purple shirt. A low-slung skirt wrapping around her shapely hips. Fishnet clung to her legs. Gaara was mesmerized.

"You're drooling." said a voice in his ear.

He almost jumped. Lee stood grinning behind him.

"Oggling Ino Yamnaka I see." He laughed.

Gaara glared.

"That wasn't ogling."

"Sure." Lee was still grinning. "But you're wasting your drool. She's not half as attractive as Haruno Sakura."

"Sakura cannot compare to this specimen." Gaara smiled, enjoying the drivel.

"She can! She's the best around!" Lee insisted.

"She's a bad kisser. Everyone says that." Gaara informed him.

"How many people has she kissed?" Lee muttered angrily to himself.

"Still dreaming about kissing her, are you?" asked Gaara.

"Don't rub it in." Lee said. "She won't even spare me a look. Let alone a kiss."

"We're pathetic." Gaara sighed. "We need to get our first kisses before we have girlfriends."

"Maybe you can ask Ino for practice sessions." suggested Lee, sliding against the tree to sit down. Gaara remained standing, just to drink him in, sitting against the tree like that.

"Maybe I will." He told him deliberately. "And maybe I won't."

Leaning down nice and slowly, so as not to startle Lee, he breathed "There's no shortage of practice dummies." If Lee flinched backwards, he'd pin him against the tree. THIS time-

"Whoop-"

The sky and earth switched for a moment, and Gaara found their positions embarrassingly reversed. He was pinned against the tree, and Lee's mouth was on his, and Lee's body was sandwiching him against the rough bark. He felt something- frightened, electrified- happy.

"Not-not here!" he gasped when the broke for air. "Your home."

"Come." was all Lee said.

He went.

xxXXxx

After the rush of feelings faded, Lee's consciousness began to kick in. He was standing in front of his own door, with no memory of how he got there, and with Gaara by his side. Now what? What had he brought him here for? What was he expecting of him? The kiss that he had forced upon that curt pale mouth was terrifying to think of. What was he to do now? He didn't know what to do!

"Open it."

Gaara had spoken with in a voice faintly tinged with irritation. Lee was disappointing him. They would probably sit and drink coffee, talking about Ino.

Lee pushed the door open and stood in the middle of the room.

"Your room." Gaara ordered.

Lee led him inside. A small plain room with a bedroll and closet met his eyes. Legwarmers on the floor. Gaara almost smiled. There was a desk in the corner and a blue mat.

And now, he paused. He and Lee looked at each other. Lee seemed to be trying to get a message across with his pleading eyes. The message was "This is crazy. Forget about it."

"Remove your shirt." Gaara said.

"Gaara!" Lee exclaimed, face flooding red. "How can you say that!"

"I won't touch." Gaara replied.

When Lee didn't move, a pained expression twisted Gaara's face. He shook. Then he stepped forward and grabbed him by the neck of his shirt.

"You don't understand." He ground out, his face inches from the face he adored so much. His mouth so close. "Do you?"

"I understand I love you." Lee said simply. "Nothing else."

Gaara kissed him. They kissed each other deep and long. His arms were so tight around him. Gaara wanted to push his hands up his shirt again, but he resisted the impulse. He did not know why. This was more important. This was what they had had forever.


	4. Chapter 4: Understand

Pairings: Rock Lee x Gaara

Rating: Definitely M

Setting: Konoha

Characters: Strong focus on Lee/Gaara. Other appearances= Kiba, Hinata, Sasuke, Ino. Characters referred to= Naruto, Sakura, Temari, Kankuro.

Note: I do not own any of these characters.

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xxXXxx

Days fell away like autumn leaves. The sun set and rose, set and rose, over and over, like it had done since earth began, never changing. Stars came out at night. People died. Gaara killed some, Lee killed some. They ate together. They spoke. They shared moments with friends. Nothing happened, and one day Lee felt himself going crazy about it.

He found himself watching for Gaara more and more, learning his movements, imprinting in his heart what each inflection in his voice meant. Suddenly there was nothing left to learn. Nothing. Gaara was no longer new and novel to him. He knew his eyes and the look in them. He knew his moods. He knew what his lips felt and tasted like. He could read his face, understand his likes. Only… two things remained- one was his mind. The second was his body. Body and mind. Everything that made Gaara the one he was, and the only things that were important. The revelation came to him late at night when he lay on his mattress. It made him laugh like an insane man. Knew him! Knew him! The only thing left was unity.

He got up, his veins glowing with purpose, like a sleepwalker that wanders so aimlessly to his aim. He walked to his door. He didn't put shoes on or change his clothes, and he was distantly conscious of pebbles jabbing him underfoot. He walked and the night air covered him in serenity. He was calm when the door was before him. He was calm when he remembered his brother and sister. Ever so serenely, he walked around the house to where his room was, and climbed with practiced ease to his window.

Gaara was awake at once, billows of sand swirling around him in alarm! "Lee!" he was hissing, sand receding. He was saying his name. "Lee, what are you- is something wrong?"

The world was growing clearer and Lee said, "I want to know you."

Gaara paused, as if fearing for Lee's sanity.

"You do know me." he offered.

"No," Lee told him, "I don't know you."

Gaara took a step back. Lee took one forwards. He put out a hand and touched the mark on his forehead. He moved the hand to his chin. He moved the chin up and tilted his face.

"Give them to me." he said, against Gaara's stiff lips.

"What?" Gaara said under his breath.

"Your mind and your body. Yourself."

Gaara was still. Then he moved his head slightly, catching the silver moonlight. His eyes glinted in an almost feral way. "You understand the other things now." was all he said. What was the implication? That Gaara had understood it all long ago? He could never tell what thoughts passed behind the forehead gruesomely scarred with the word "Love".

But Gaara's hands were on him now, stopping his shaking, gentle as they pushed him onto the bed, gentle as they touched his face while he kissed him, gentle as they roamed his stomach through the cloth. This gentleness… this tender feeling… There was nothing to be afraid of here. As he looked up at the face focused on him so deeply, he gave himself up to it.

Half an hour later, his shirt was gone, his slacks ruffled up, his body decorated with the love-bites of a long suppressed love, streaming with sweat and the wet trails of Gaara's tongue. But Gaara went no further. He only stretched himself across Lee and held him, as if savoring this. The world was new again.

xxXXxx


	5. Chapter 5: Lovers' Quarrel

Pairings: Rock Lee x Gaara

Rating: Definitely M

Setting: Konoha

Characters: Strong focus on Lee/Gaara. Other appearances= Kiba, Hinata, Sasuke, Ino. Characters referred to= Naruto, Sakura, Temari, Kankuro.

Note: I do not own any of these characters.

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"I can smell it on you." Kiba was grinning toothily.

"Wh-what?" Lee stammered, his embarrassment threatening to make him faint.

"You try hiding it so hard, but it's obvious to me that you and he-" Kiba went on, grinning gleefully.

"Do shut up Kiba." Hinata interrupted, frowning.

"Thanks." Gaara told her.

"I was just teasing!" Kiba whined. "You know how ol' Lee gets about sex lives…"

"Of which you have none." Hinata stated primly.

"Come on, now that you're getting married to Naruto, you make it sound like sex is all that makes life complete-"

"N-No! Of course not!"

"Falling in love is slow." Gaara put in. Hinata and Kiba looked solemn at this.

"You're right about that." Sasuke murmured unexpectedly from a corner.

"Oh just shut up and get her." Kiba said impatiently. "She's crazy about you."

But Sasuke stared silently at the river across from them. Gaara knew he was thinking the same thoughts that had passed through his own mind not long ago; falling in love also called for self-inspection. The question that haunted a mind in love was always "Am I worthy enough?"

Gaara had thought of that too, a little too recently for his comfort. In bed. With Lee. Lee who was touching him, asking him to stop being so distant now because it didn't feel right, Lee who was pushing in as Gaara watched him contemplatively.

"Gaara, I said I love you." Lee told him.

"You do." Gaara agreed.

xxXXxx

The moon hung low, the night was clean and star-speckled. The village slept the deep sleep that safety invites. At least, most of them did. The patrolling ninja were awake. And as for Gaara, he was always awake, night after sleepless night. Especially today. Today his bed was warm with the presence of a lover, and he had no intention of falling asleep anytime soon.

Lee rolled his tongue around in Gaara's mouth, sweeping all the teeth, tussling with the other tongue. His mouth caressed Gaara's moist, softened lips over and over, slipping off it, into it, chewing his lower lip slightly. Then he paused and shifted a little. Gaara stilled under him. Lee looked at his face for a moment, and then lifted his head. At once, a hand descended roughly on his neck and tried to force him back towards his ministrations, but Lee pushed it away and got off Gaara.

Gaara tensed, and felt a small pang of anger, followed by mild confusion.

"What?" he asked, his voice hard.

Lee did not reply, he just sat there; Gaara suddenly wondered if he had done something wrong.

"You didn't notice how quiet I was." Lee suddenly accused, just as Gaara was drawing up a mental list of possible offences. He was taken aback by Lee's words. Where had this come from? He sat up as well and looked more closely at the person sitting stiffly next to him.

"… I thought you were paying more attention to me than usual." he said, choosing his words carefully. "But I can't read your mind."

Lee looked even angrier at this.

"Don't you think it's time Gaara?" he snapped, making an irritated gesture with his hand.

"For… what?"

"You barely ever speak to me." Lee said, annoyed at how Gaara could not understand where his irritation lay. "You don't tell me what's on your mind, and so I can't understand you. Here I am, unclothed before you and in your bed, many times in your body, yet you are silent. You don't bare your thoughts."

Gaara's forehead was prickling with nerves. Apparently, his beloved did not understand that some people were actually born as taciturn as Lee was talkative.

"I'm just that way." he explained.

"You've never even said you love me." Lee was saying listlessly. "Maybe you don't. Your attraction always did seem to focus on the physical aspect, but I…"

"Listen to me." Gaara said, moving to face Lee.

"How? You say nothing." Lee replied. "You take me for a mind reader maybe. Is this bond anything to you at all?"

"Yes it is. It's important to me." Gaara felt like he was losing his footing somewhere. "It's precious."

"You don't act like it is. You just… kiss me a lot." Lee mumbled.

They sat in silence for a while, as Gaara pondered how to "act like it". Awkward minutes crept by. Then Lee swung his legs over the side of the bed, picked up his clothes and began to dress. Gaara stood up as well, slightly panicked.

"Lee, stop, what are you doing?" he demanded.

"I'm going home. I'll see you tomorrow." Lee muttered dully, zipping up the spandex.

"At least see the night through!" Gaara cried. The zipper made a final sort of noise.

"Some other day." Lee was saying, walking out the door.

"Come back, I'll kill you!" Gaara ground out in rage.

Lee only stopped to turn around at the entrance and say, "I love you."

"I hate you." Gaara hissed as the door snapped shut. Even as he said it, he was hoping Lee hadn't heard him.


	6. Chapter 6: Can You Say It?

Pairings: Rock Lee x Gaara

Rating: Definitely M

Setting: Konoha

Characters: Strong focus on Lee/Gaara. Other appearances= Kiba, Hinata, Sasuke, Ino. Characters referred to= Naruto, Sakura, Temari, Kankuro.

Note: I do not own any of these characters.

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xxXXxx

Absence. Absence. Absence.

Gaara was going wild. He was avoiding him. He did not understand him. They were just too different to let each other know their minds. How would they mean anything to each other this way? This had to stop.

First he tried to figure out what Lee meant to him. That was simple. The images of Lee's smile, the vibrant memory of his teeth lightly biting into his neck, the words he spoke, the moods he had- he meant happiness to Gaara. But how would he convey those feelings to him, show him the pictures in his head. His words- his words would seem… he did not know how to tell him.

In the end, a simple answer came to Gaara. All he had to do was find a medium other than his voice and his body.

xxxXXXxxx

Two people stood there, in the middle of a friendly-looking kitchen, glaring at each other. Gaara stood here, in Lee's kitchen, glaring at the man who would not listen to reason. Lee stood there, stubborn and tired-looking. They had just had an argument that had gotten them nowhere. Gaara was sure now, that spoken words were not the answer. Lee refused to believe him, and conversations plunged into chaos and took entire leave of reason as the two young men's feelings swelled, peaked, and became inflected with rage, hurt and self-pity.

So, before he gave himself a second thought, he was pulling the thin notebook out of his jacket. Lee looked quizzically at it.

Gaara thrust it roughly at him.

"Gaara- what..?"

"Read." He demanded.

"Why?" asked Lee. His features formed obstinate lines.

"This is what you want to know." Gaara breathed.

Lee took the book, sighing. "I don't know what you think you're doing, Gaara." he said. "This foolishness. This- this game we-"

Then his eyes fell upon the words, and his voice died away.

"It's never really ever the same, the way it feels. Never. His eyes are always warm like that, but everyday they look like they have never been warmer. He looks at me the same way every day and every night, but it always feels, in the heat of the moment, that he has never looked more loving. And when his lips come closer and I can't see his face and my eyes are open while his close and our lips press and melt together and his tongue is deep inside my mouth and I am twisting his face to drag him closer, to swallow him, it always feels like I have never kissed him before. Why is that? Am I in love? How long have I been in love? I cannot answer. I cannot remember. Because when he is there, questions vanish. There is nothing more to ask of the universe that has given him to me."

Lee abruptly broke away from this passage, face flushed.

"Gaara!" he stammered. "This is… a diary of some sort? You wrote this?"

"Just read it." said Gaara.

Lee, looking oddly frightened, obliged.

"And when deep into the night hours, I lie by his side, and he holds me like I am precious, I feel like this is the first time in my lonely life I am being held. He is asleep and breathing into my neck. I am awake and I watch him in wonder and dream of the cold terror of having him taken away. In the morning when he is awake and alive and full of enthusiasm, I feel relieved."

And sometimes at night, neither of us sleeps. Instead we wrap ourselves around each other and share heat, share everything, unify into one being, one sweet and burning moment of bliss. He is everywhere, he makes sure of it. Nothing is untouched. Nothing unkissed. In these moments I cannot close my eyes to the expressions on his face, however much I want to so that my ears can concentrate on the sounds he makes. He is beneath me, he is above me, he is beside me. I can't say what I prefer. Him lying under me, groaning and sighing? Or looking up at him from where he is perched to drag out my voice with the pleasure he inflicts? Nothing feels better than whatever we are doing.

Sometimes after we finally drift off, I lie and watch his essence dry into stickiness on my stomach. I don't feel like wiping it off, just like I wish the marks my teeth made on his neck would stay there, forever, so that he belongs to me. Just like my semen drying on his chin. He never swallows, but he licks a little. I like to watch him do it. His lips are such a perfect shape, although his eyes are strange. Whenever I remark this to my brother or sister, they laugh and say everything about him is strange, from his haircut to his green clothing. It aggravates me to see something so precious scorned like a trifle. But I remind myself that he is precious only to me because he belongs only to me. Every bit of him belongs to me. Every one of his breaths, which I can hear at night. Every one of his fingers, which I can take into my mouth and taste, fingers that touch me all over. Ever one of his eyelashes which lie on his cheek as he sleeps. The muscles on his arms are mine. The muscles on his back. His strong legs. Scars in places only I have ever seen. His entirety has been enveloped and caressed and touched and tasted and loved and marked by only me, as I by him. It's simple to understand."

It ended there, and Lee still felt as if he had just walked through a dream, on air. He could hardly bring himself to lift his head and look at Gaara, afraid that none of it would have happened. Afraid at the teeming emotions that spilled warm into his hands from this old little book. They were so precious. He was afraid of what to do with them.

But lift his head he did, because Gaara's face was lowered. He let him look without staring back. This way, it was easier.

Now what were they to say to each other?

"I didn't know." Lee managed to mumble.

"I never say it. You're no mind reader." said Gaara, eyes still on the floor.

There was a silence. Then Lee asked, "Can you say it?"

"I… " Gaara stammered. "I love you. Always. I want you. Always."

Lee's eyes were glittering with strange tears. He grabbed Gaara's face in both his hands, pinning their eyes to each others'. He kissed him, deeply, rolling out his tongue into the soft firm mouth. Gaara's tongue caressed his back, struggled with it. It licked the shape of Lee's lips. His hands were already at Lee's belt.

"How can you think…" Gaara was saying breathlessly, his own eyes threatening to spill in relief, and some leftover hurt, "How can you think I… you don't… the way I touch you…"

The tears were blinding Lee now. "Sorry… sorry…" he was muttering over and over again, ceasing the kiss, just holding on to Gaara. Gaara was holding him just as hard. An anchor. He was Lee's. He understood it, all over again.


	7. Chapter 7: Home

Gaara always watched the rain with his siblings, all three perched on the rooftops, enjoying something rare and special together. It had been raining lightly, so that the sky was faintly pink and flaked with clouds. Everything under the sky looked lush and new, decked in dew-drops. Small mushrooms would spring up in the verdant grass later, and flowers would display the sort of colours that would make everything else dull by comparison. Here was something they had never had in Suna, something to marvel at and be thankful for together. Something to remind them of where they came from, and strangely, to make them miss it all the more for it.

Temari was next to him, smiling slightly, hair speckled with raindrops that looked like small jewels. Kankuro was on his other side, chewing on a small stick clutched in his teeth. He noticed that he was now always in the middle, flanked by both of them. It seemed that Temari and Kankuro, truly his siblings, always wanted him safe between them. The guilt of their early lives never left them.

He wondered then, if they were so close, whether or not to tell them about Lee.

"Temari?" he said.

"Mmm?" she answered, not looking around at him. He wondered why she didn't turn to him, and then Kankuro winked at him from over her shoulder. Gaara suddenly understood. He followed her gaze and saw it focused on a slouching young man, hair pulled back into a rather strict ponytail. Shikamaru, the young Shinobi she had fallen in love with, so long ago.

"I need something to eat. I'm going out." Kankuro said mildly, shaking raindrops out of his hair.

Temari said, a little too quickly, "I need to go somewhere too. I'll leave as well."

Kankuro flashed Gaara a grin again and said "Yeah, okay. See you then, Gaara."

"See you." said Gaara.

They left. Gaara could see Temari only a short while later, walking purposefully in to catch up with Shikamaru. Then he realized something.

Temari had never told them. Neither him nor Kankuro. But they both knew where her head and her heart were. Because they were siblings. They were close.

There was no reason to tell them about Lee. A sibling's instinct would have deduced that long, long ago, he was sure. They must know. And now, they would understand that he had figured out they knew about what he and Lee felt for each other.

But all these thoughts of Lee… they were trickling free and steady through his mind… He wondered what Lee was doing right now.

Quietly, Gaara lifted his gourd and leapt off the rooftop, intent on finding the man who was always invading his mind.

What have you done to me, Rock Lee? Gaara grinned to himself. Are you a magnet of some sort?

xxxxxXXXXXxxxxx

Lee was on his knees, peering at the small white flowers just by his doorstep. He got up, and almost crashed into Gaara. Taijutsu training, for some reason, never stopped him from falling over backwards like a fool, especially in front of Gaara. His head hit the ground hard.

"Ouch! Gaara, don't sneak up on me! And how the hell did you ever learn to be so quiet!" he demanded, rubbing his head and getting up.

"It's what most shinobi learn." grinned Gaara. "You're just too naturally loud and obvious for any amount training to thump it out of you."

"I will argue that point with you shortly," Lee glared, grabbing Gaara by his collar and jerking him forward like a rag doll "after I have kissed you until you can't breathe."

"It's so strange," Gaara murmured onto the shape of Lee's lips, "how much you affect my breathing."

"Come inside, and I'll affect it even more." Lee whispered in promise. "Come inside."

"Do you expect me to refuse, that you repeated it twice?"

"I want you to hurry."

"You want me?"

"I want you."

"You already have me, you spider, with your infernal web." smiled Gaara, shaking his head at himself and the things Lee made him say.

"I was under the impression that you were the spider." Lee laughed, tugging Gaara in through his door, "and I was the one tangled up in your web."

"Look who's luring me into his house." argued Gaara.

"Look who's walking ahead of me into it."

"A fool in love?"

"Yep. Just like the one behind him."

Gaara entered Lee's familiar room, but was drawn to the window that cooled the room with rain-breezes and the smell of wet earth. The top ledge still spilled raindrops onto the leaves directly underneath. He put out a hand and caught some of them. Lee came to stand by him.

"You love the rain, don't you?" he asked.

"It seems an almost extravagant luxury." Gaara breathed. "Compared to my home."

"Gaara, when will you consider Konoha your home?" Lee questioned.

"Never, I think. It's too different. And the power I had there… I am a king, without a kingdom." Gaara's tone was becoming flat with gloom.

Lee watched him, but said nothing.

"In Konoha, I am a… an…" Gaara struggled. "I am ordinary. A common shinobi."

"Not to me." Lee said. "Not to the people who know you."

Gaara turned his back to the window, smirking. "Who bows to me here? I am no-" He stopped speaking.

Lee was standing before him, looking down at him with a strange look in his eyes.

Very deliberately, Lee got down on one knee, lowered his head and put one fist on the floor and one against his heart.

"Lee." Gaara was bewildered. "Lee stand up. You're not-"

"If you want to be a king, with only one subject, I will be that subject."

"Lee, you fool, don't-"

"I am bound to you by the mad feelings you create in me."

"You-"

"I will do anything. Anything you ever ask me to do. Whether you are a king, or a beggar, or a thief, or a giver."

Gaara didn't say anything. He just stared at the earnest man he made love to, bowing before him in all sincerity.

"Can I kiss your hand?" Lee asked, reaching for it, pressing it to his mouth.

"Fool." Gaara murmured tenderly.

"Gaara, when will you consider my home," Lee asked against Gaara's hand, "as your home? Your small kingdom?"

"Stand up." Gaara whispered. Lee stood up.

"I order you to kiss me."

Lee pulled Gaara over onto the bed, settled on top of him, and began to kiss him.


	8. Chapter 8: Letting Go

The gods had been kind. They had let thirty years pass for them to fall in love, to stay in love, to become infused into each other- to become one and the same. To have shared everything. To have learned everything about the other. To have eaten, and bathed, and slept, and dreamt, and fought together.

And then one day, those gods had done this. They had done this, and Gaara was on his knees, here on his knees, afraid to look at the wound, afraid of the dying eyes his lover was fixing on him.

The cave was safe, only mildly dark. Temari and the others guarded the exit. Some of the wounded lay here and there. But Gaara had not seen any of it. He had run and crashed to his knees by the side of that body.

"G-guu- gaa" Lee had burbled through the blood in his mouth, half conscious. He had lifted his hand and Gaara gripped it like a lifeline and pressed it to his forehead, eyes screwed, lungs threatening to scream once they allowed him to breathe again.

"It's poison." Someone said. "It can't be healed! Oh God, somebody save him."

Oh God, somebody save him.

Oh God.

Somebody.

"I… Gaahh"

"Don't." Gaara sobbed. He tried to choke the other words out but they seemed stuck like thorns in his throat. "S-speak."

"…won't…" Lee was making a herculean effort to speak. Gaara wanted to hush him, but he was crying too hard. The blood was soaking Gaara's sandals.

"...Won't…" Lee persisted. "…leave… y- yhh… you."

Yes. Don't leave me. Don't go.

"The pain he must be in!" some woman was screaming. "Look at that thing! He is torn to shreds! Someone kill him, please! Oh God… his liver…"

'Someone kill him.'- the words got to Gaara. With a great effort of will, he forced himself to look at the wound- and terrified pain rippled through his body. Lee's pain. That thing… it should have killed him. The pain, it would hurt like nothing he could have experienced. The waist was terribly torn and broken. Bits of bone were jaggedly peering through the leaking red, the giant gaping hole.

Yet Lee was clinging tenuously to life, trying to fight off death- only for Gaara's sake. That promise. He was bound by his promise to Gaara. "I will stay with you forever." he had said, holding Gaara, who had said he would go mad if Lee was taken away. He could not die, for Gaara's sake.

He could not die. Yet he could not live. Not with that. The clinically rational part of Gaara's psyche informed him that wounds like that would kill almost instantaneously. The pain he must be bearing for him, fighting to stay with him. New warm tears rolled off Gaara's face. He touched Lee's hair.

"Lee." he said. "Lee. Lee, my Lee."

He leaned in close, the way he did every time they slept together. Used to sleep. His tears were dripping onto Lee's face, running down the face he loved, loved so much.

"I… " Lee struggled. "… won't…"

"Hush. Stop Lee." Gaara whispered. "Listen to me."

The black eyes focused on him.

"You can go, Lee." Gaara said, voice breaking.

"…. Nhh… never…" Lee ground out.

"Lee, you are dying." Gaara whispered. "Go."

"He…heal…" Lee gasped. "Heal… me."

"This poison cannot be healed." Gaara said, clenching the bandaged hand, bringing it to his lips.

"Tsu… tsu… naaa… de…"

"She's long dead Lee, don't you remember?" Gaara said, tears trickling onto Lee's hand. "Why have I done this to you? I have taken your peace."

"…never… leave….." Lee stubbornly whispered.

"Listen to me." Gaara said. "Lee, seeing you like this… I know this is wrong. I was wrong to request immortality of you. You must let yourself go." He leaned in closer, touched Lee's lips to his own, gently. "But I promise you… can you hear me?... once my duties are done… I will come find you." He kissed Lee's forehead. "I will come to the same place, Lee. Wait for me there." His voice was breaking again and his sight was blurred. He brought Lee's hand to his trembling mouth another time. "And there we'll never… die. We'll have forever. Like we talked about. Like we wanted."

Lee's eyes were losing focus. He seemed to grow more serene.

"Forever Lee." Gaara whispered. "Go in peace. And Wait for me. I love you so much. So much, Lee."

Lee's eyes were closed, and a tear was slipping down one of them.

"I… lo.. love…" he tried to say.

"Yes." Gaara said. "You do."

And long after the last of his life had gone from him, Gaara cradled the shell left behind, and cried as if no sadness like his could ever be borne.

The war dragged on. At some point, it ended. At some point, life wrapped him back into its fold. At some point he wrote out battle plans and signed records. He ate with friends. He smiled occasionally, a hollow thing for felicitous occasions, such as Temari's marriage to that Konoha nin. Such as their child climbing onto his knee. Such things. Such small, detached things that showed that time was moving, that time was taking him closer to Lee. How much he awaited death. How much.

xxxxxxxXXXXXxxxxxxxxx

Everything here is white, like new-fallen snow. There is no floor or sky.

What strange mist.

Strange.

Everything here is strange.

It has been strange so long.

But why?

Why doesn't it change?

…

…

Movement. Over there.

…

…

Oh.

There.

There he is.

Yes, him.

…

Yes, here you are.

Here you are.

Oh.

The mist is going away.

…

…

How long has it been since I saw a sky?

…

What are these?

Are they jewels?

Oh.

They are his eyes.

They are your eyes.

They are you.

You are here.

Gaara, you are here.

Gaara! You are here.

Gaara! You are here!

Gaara! I waited! I told you I would wait!

…

…

…

…

"I love you."

"Yes. You do."

"You love me too."

"Yes. I do."

"Do we have forever?"

"Yes. We do."

"Stay by me."

xxxXXXXXxxxx

Thank you for the reviews.

Especially Frostedwaffle. It keeps me writing.

I am sorry to end this here. There were more chapters, but I was driven to conclude through their ineffectiveness.


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